Clocks
by Weapon Frayer
Summary: With the chance of saving Hughes given by Truth, Roy is catapulted into different worlds, but all of them with the same outcome. This leaves Roy with one question: how do I save the world, Maes Hughes, and myself at the same time? Manga/Brotherhood continuity, but with elements from CoS. Rated T for violence and future chapter content.
1. La Porte

**Author's Note:**

 **So, after re-rewatching Brotherhood, I was really, REALLY depressed about the death of Hughes.**

 **I also remembered the one part towards the end, where Roy goes through the gate.**

 **This sparked an idea in my head, so I'll see where it goes.**

 **The fic's name is based on Coldplay's awesome song of the same name, if you're wondering.**

 **Anyways, hope you enjoy it! Leave a review, if I should continue this!**

* * *

 **Chapter 1 - L** **a Porte (The Gate)**

The moment Roy regained his bearings, was also the moment of truth for him. Quite literally, for him.

"Hello."

Roy spun around, and saw a white, faceless figure, that appeared to mirror his physical form to a T.

He gasped, as he fully turned his body around.

"Who are you? And where am I?"

The faceless figure just smirked, unmoving.

"Who am I?"

Roy turned around once more, to see a rather large, and ornate gate, with writing in various ancient languages written on it.

"I am called by many names. I am what some call 'God'. Or what some call the 'universe'. Or I am also 'the Truth'. I am one, and I am all."

It pointed at Roy. "And I am also you."

Roy's face donned a shocked one, but then moved back to a stoic one.

"So then, explain why I'm here."

Truth's mouth was filled with the wist of a cruel smile. "It's simple, actually. You performed human transmutation."

Roy's mouth fell, as he stuttered a retort. "T-that wasn't me! I didn't start the-"

"Quiet now."

Roy hushed, as Truth continued talking.

"How would you respond, if I told you, that you could save your friend?"

Roy's thoughts were on overdrive. "Wait, you mean Maes Hughes? _The_ Brigadier General, Maes Hughes?!"

He ran up to Truth, desperation in his eyes.

"Please! How can I save my friend?!"

A droplet of tears trinkled down Roy's face, as he kneeled and begged in front of the almighty entity.

"It's equivalent exchange, right?"

"I'll do anything! I'd give up anything!"

Truth's twisted grin grew even more feral. "Alright then, we have ourselves a deal!"

The gate behind Roy opened, as he stared in horror at the black arms rushing towards him.

As they started pulling him, Roy screamed.

"How is this equivalent exchange?!"

Truth grinned, still as a rock. "You'll find out soon enough, _Block Commander_ Roy Mustang!"

* * *

When Roy woke up, his head ached, and his eyes were blurry.

Suddenly, he heard a deep voice yelling. At him, who knew.

" _Blockf_ _ührer_ Rotenstein, you're late again!"

As Roy rubbed his eyes, he looked at his hands.

There were two things he noticed.

One, his gloves were missing.

Two, instead of a Amestrian military uniform, he saw a red wristband, with black points, and a white background.

* * *

 **End Note:**

 **Well, that ends Chapter 1.**

 **I apologize for the length of the chapter, but I want to get a good start, with clear-ups.**

 **If you guys don't know what happened, the soul of Roy from Brotherhood has just been placed into a prison guard's body; who just so happens to be working at a Nazi concentration camp.**

 **Anyways, hope you enjoyed! Remember to R &R, follow and favorite, and DFTBA!**


	2. Marsch der Adler

**Author's Note:**

 ***reminds self that reading alt-history does things to one's mind***

 **Must...write...more...**

 **Oh boy. This chapter took a while to write, for research reasons and writer's block.**

 **Anyways, hope you enjoy!**

* * *

 **Chapter 2 -** **Marsch der Adler (March of the Eagles)**

Roy stared at the red wristband, suddenly feeling a need to look at a mirror.

Slowly rising from his bunk, he was greeted with a slap in the face.

"Rotenstein! Get yourself ready, and _don't_ slack off."

The man responsible for this, for some reason, looked familiar to Roy.

 _Wait...was that Havoc?!_

He jumped up, eyes searching for a bathroom.

 _Ah! There's one!_

He walked into the 'bathroom', _more like a glorified trash can._

Indeed, Roy could see the sight of flies buzzing around something, and rotting trash. Roy had to squeeze his nose.

Walking up to a mirror, he looked at his physical appearance.

And all was not all as it seemed.

* * *

"Hugo!"

Thomas Hugo peered up, from his lunch. "Sir, one of your subordinates appears to be unconscious."

Thomas waved it off. "Oh come one, let him rest." He smirked. "And you too, Johann. You overwork yourself."

Johann saluted. "Duly noted, sir."

Thomas laughed. "Come on, Johann. Don't need to salute me every ticking second."

His face changed to a more serious one. "When I'm done, I'll wake him up."

* * *

It had been an odd hour or two, but Roy Mustang had experienced more shock than being hit by lighting multiple times, while freezing in water.

That analogy fit well here, Roy noted. Here he was, stuck in an unknown world, and he couldn't do anything about it.

He was currently being dragged towards the camp office, literally, by his direct superior, and someone who's face Roy had not seen. Yet.

"If you get screwed over again, I'm not saving your ass."

Roy looked, and as the door closed, his face slowly started to don a look of shock.

 _Is that you...Hughes?_

* * *

"2nd Lieutenant Rotenstein, please have a seat."

Roy nervously pulled out a wooden chair from under the desk, gazing at the Colonel's stone cold eyes.

It was ironic, to say the least, Roy bitterly thought, as he sat down. _When I get back to Amestris_ , he thought, _I'll-_

"Please listen."

Roy's head shot up, as he stared at the Colonel's blue eyes.

"My name is Franz Halding, but you will refer to me as Colonel, during the duration of the meeting.

Roy, being reminded of his instincts he picked up in the Amestrian military, complied and saluted. "Yes sir!"

Colonel Halding's mouth twitched a bit, muttering about ' _disrespectful youths_ '.

"As you know, the Fatherland is battling our greatest enemy to our very existence at the moment."

He started to unroll a map, which as Roy watched, looked absolutely _nothing_ like the world he had left behind.

Halding flicked the cap off of a pen, circling places that Roy had no clue how far it was away, in red and grey.

This, Roy thought, with the amount of details _already_ on the map, along with the numerous additions that Halding was making, meant that this 'war' or whatever name would be suitable, was much more than an uprising.

Looking at the troop numbers, Roy internally gasped. _How many innocents are going to die for this?!_

He kept staring at the map, his mind shattered. What he had just saw, were the battle plans for the most ambitious battle; no, operation that would ever be conducted.

Starting to skirt his eyes up, Roy saw the total troop numbers and supplies involved:

 **Army Group North:**

 **Commander: Fedor von Bock  
-700,000 troops  
-770 tanks  
-4,000 artillery pieces**

 **Army Group Center:**

 **Commander: Fedor von Bock  
-1,300,000 troops  
-2,600 tanks  
-7,800 artillery pieces**

 **Army Group South:**

 **Commander: Gerd von Rundstedt  
-1,000,000 troops  
-1,000 tanks  
-5,700 artillery pieces**

And finally, Roy read the title page out loud, of the blueprint of death.

" _Operation Barbarossa_ _..._ "

* * *

 **End Note:**

 **Oh boy, you can tell this isn't going to end well, when you're working with the Nazis.**

 **This is a bit ridiculous, but I want to hear your opinion: which Army Group will Roy be assigned to? I want you guys to decide, on where the story goes, based on that.**

 **Also, the current time of the story is (about) nearing the end of April 1941, FYI.**

 **Hope you enjoyed! R &R, follow and favorite, and DFTBA!**

 **EDIT: The poll is now live, on my profile! Go vote, if you want to influence the story!**


	3. Die Walküre

**Author's Note:**

 **With some feedback from some close friends, and one reviewer, I have decided to assign Roy to Army Group South.**

 **Of course, this means he probably will be fighting in Stalingrad.**

 **And this might get sad.**

 **...**

 **Anyways, hope you enjoy this chapter! Leave feedback so I can improve the fic...enjoy!**

* * *

 **Chapter 3 - Die Walküre**

Roy was promptly dismissed from the colonel's office after the meeting.

The sheer existence of the battle plans awed Roy, as images of vehicles he had never seen from the body of a man who had seen the advent of them flooded his mind.

 _I see...so this world has tanks too, huh?_ An image of a tank flashed through his mind.

 _And there's another invention, too..._

The image of what appeared to be a slim bodied, brown object, with paper wings and propellers, intrigued Roy very much.

Suddenly, the object's propellers started to revolve. Roy thought, seeing this in his mind.

The object then soared into the sky, like a valkyrie ascending towards a battle site.

 _So this is what they call a plane._ Roy was astonished, that such a thing could be thought about and succeed, let alone exist.

"Rotenstein!"

Roy turned abruptly, and saw once again, the splitting image of Maes Hughes.

He saluted, not out of respect, but out of an instinct he had picked up in Ishval. "Yes sir!"

This world's version of Hughes was quite similar in appearance; hell, they could pass for identical twins.

 _But,_ Roy thought, _appearance isn't everything._

From Roy's quick and initial observations, this Hughes was a lot more tired, and less of a joker, but more of an actual soldier.

He still donned his signature glasses, but he was also more built; more fit, to be exact.

"Come with me. All of the Block Leaders are ordered to come down to the front entrance." He waved his hand, gesturing for Roy to go with him.

Roy said nothing, but saluted anyways.

* * *

"This is insanity!"

The lieutenants and lower-ranked officers murmured among themselves, about the newly-announced plan that the German High Command, and the Führer had announced.

In truth, this plan had taken months of planning, and thousands of tons of supplies and oil to be stockpiled, in order to begin the plan.

But that was not the main point of the announcements, General Johann Halsberg thought. No, it was mainly to assign posts for the invasion.

"Men! In order, by brigade!"

The basic soldiers and conscripts were the first to be called. Next were the lieutenants and captains of the brigade, which Roy promptly got into position in his brigade; the _Schatten Walküren_ , or Shadow Valkyries, aptly named in terrified murmurs in the local population.

Although they were much less in number compared to the _Schutzstaffel_ , the Shadow Valkyries were a special breed of soldier.

Unlike many of the soldiers who were enlisted or forced to by the government, the Shadow Valkyries were handpicked by the _Führer_ himself, who were then trained in special combat operations that quite literally defied space and time, and be conditioned to receive any amount of torture, yet still live at the end.

 _However,_ Roy muttered through all of the events that seemed to fade into the background, _it seems as if this process made many of them emotionless._

Suddenly, a whistle blew.

"Shadow Valkyries!"

All of them, Roy included, saluted once more.

Roy recognized the figure with cigarette in mouth and smirk. _Jean Havoc, here you are._

This world's Havoc was _definitely_ different than the Havoc Roy knew, in terms of both appearance and personality.

For one thing, 'Havoc' had bright, blue eyes that reminded Roy of that new fashion that was starting to emerge in Amestris.

For another, his face showed a much higher level of arrogance than Roy expected of the Havoc in Amestris. At that level, he would expect that out of one of the soldiers in the academy that bullied Heathcliff Erbe. That memory left a sour taste in Roy's mouth, which was reflected by his face with a slowly gritting mouth.

Finally, just like alternate Hughes, this Havoc looked much more tired than back in Amestris. It was more evident with Havoc, with bags under his eyes, indicating that he had not slept for days, while trying to stay awake.

The cigarette dropped out of Havoc's mouth, and landed on the white circle on his sleeve.

"Move out!"

* * *

Above the ruckus of the front of the regimental camp, a cloaked figure listened, ears intent on listening in.

After the Shadow Valkyries had left, the figure pulled out a small, concealed radio, and began to speak.

"Radio #4 reporting. All men are out of the premises. Prepare to receive transmission."

A voice, speaking in a distinctly Russian accent replied. " _All receivers on._ "

The figure spoke. "Reporting, from _Dantsig_ Brigade Camp. Invasion of the motherland has been scheduled, to begin on the 9th of June. _Dantsigorel_ out."

* * *

 **End Note:**

 **There is going to be some confusion about the dates, but let me clear it up:**

 **First, the date that 'Shadow Eagle' (not telling you their identity yet!) mentions uses the Russian Orthodox calendar. The date when Operation Barbarossa actually began is June 22nd on our calendar, Europeans and Americans alike.**

 **Second, Barbarossa is still being finished in terms of planning.**

 **Hope you enjoyed! Leave constructive feedback, on how I can improve the story!**

 **Remember to R &R, follow and favorite, and DFTBA!**


	4. Schwerttanz

**Author's Note:**

 **The action will pick up next chapter! I swear! XD**

 **The identity of 'der Adler' will be revealed. You may or may not be surprised.**

 **To some of the reviewers:**

 **Remember when I said that this had _hints_ of CoS?**

 **You might see a certain someone in here, that's _not_ native to this universe in this chapter. LOL**

 **(Please read the past 2 sentences like how Chuggaconroy on YouTube is about to torture himself for the viewers: sarcastic, yet cheerful.)**

 **But anyways, to the story! Remember to R &R, follow and favorite, and DFTBA!**

* * *

 **Chapter 4 -** **Schwerttanz (Sword Dance)**

They had left the town by dawn.

The figure looked around, casually trying to blend into the drab, raining atmosphere of Danzig. The port city used to be a great trading port, back in the olden days of the Commonwealth, and even to this day, where its counterpart stole its glitz and glory, it was still a major hub for the military.

But now was not the time for touring an already mostly unattractive city.

The figure walked for an hour more, until it opened the door to a small cottage out in the outskirts of the city, and closed the door.

Someone yelled out from inside the house, in German.

"Hey! You there! What is the password!"

The figure yelled back in accented German.

"The password is ' _Grund besiegt alles_ '!"

Suddenly, the lights came to life, the figure seeing a multitude of soldiers, the one who stood out the most being a man with brown hair, vibrant green eyes, and a pistol in hand.

"Show yourself!"

The hooded figure pulled down their hood.

And to many of the soldiers' surprise, they saw a young woman, with blond hair and brown eyes, wielding a hidden rifle attached to a mobile radio phone.

"Good day to you, comrades."

* * *

 **Somewhere Outside Premissel, Soviet-Occupied Poland, June 22nd, 1941  
3:00 AM**

Somewhere, in a Wehrmacht camp just west of Przemyśl, or Premissel, as the Germans called it, fateful orders were given, that would change the destiny of Europe, and the wider world, within minutes.

Near the artillery section of the camp, was the commander's tent, which was the destination of the messenger boy.

The dirty blonde stumbled through the camp, trying to avoid all of the other soldiers. He had a mission, and it was absolutely urgent.

Somewhere in the distance, a blond-haired man caught a faint glimpse of the boy. The man shook his head, and rubbed his eyes, talking to himself.

Finally, after much hurry, the boy reached the tent of Major General Karl von Franzberg, the leading commander of the 'Shadow Valkyries'. He tripped in, accidentally dropping a few papers. One of them stated the final confirmation for the first strike on Soviet lines, and another was a seemingly blank paper, with no writing on it.

"Sir, I have," the boy panted, trying to pick up all of the papers, forgetting one of them on the floor, "the final confirmation."

The general frowned, his jawline showing signs of annoyance and impatience. "What is the signature for final confirmation, sir?"

Karl raised a brow at the signature. He growled, and dropped the piece of paper. "It's been signed personally, by the Führer himself, so it seems."

Indeed, in his signature messy, disheveled handwriting, he could (barely) make out the words ' _ **Adolf Hitler,** **Führer of Germany**_ '.

He paused for a second while looking outside, and suddenly, grinned a very wide, and psychotic grin.

"Well, if we're going to die, we might as well die for the Führer!"

He raised his right hand skywards, and started to laugh like an insane maniac.

Some of the soldiers peered out of their tents, eyes dark and sleepy. They had to prepare for this like no _volk_ of Germany had ever had to, yet their 'temporary' residence was akin to those of the lowliest privates and recruits, which naturally, made them feel cranky and irritated.

" _Heil Hitler! Heil Deutschland!_ We're all going to die, anyways!"

All of a sudden, as the boy started to stumble back in fear, the Major General started to bark out orders.

"7th Regiment, you are the Shadow Valkyries! You have been trained to strike fear and make sure all bow and kneel down to our glorious motherland!"

The men in the camp started to fully get out of their tents, picking up their equipment and supplies, while getting their 'disguises' on. "Your task is to preserve, protect, and make sure the great _Reich_ survives, with all your heart, mind, and soul!"

After about 3 minutes, the entire regiment, composed of a mini officer corps, and entirely separate and free from all command barring the Führer himself. Blond haired men alike, with blue eyes ranging from dark, mystic oceans, to soaring skies, were lined up in filed order, saluting with a neutral face.

Karl finally said the words that they were trained to react to.

" ** _Shadow Valkyries, move out!_** "

After he had sent the Valkyries out, Karl was obligated to send the orders that he was happy to abide by.

Calling the local guns in Dubiecko, he sent out the final orders that would decide millions of lives and the entire European continent.

"Sir, we're getting a radio signal from Maj. General Franzberg! The towers say it is an urgent matter!"

The radio operator was rolling around, trying to decide on a course of action. " _Then answer it, dammit!_ "

He picked up the radio, and tuned to Karl's radio.

"Die würfel sind gefallen. _I repeat,_ die würfel sind gefallen."

The radio operator knew what this was code for.

"Colonel Storbach, Maj. General Franzberg is ordering an artillery strike on Soviet lines!"

The line was silent for seconds, then Col. Storbach broke the silence.

"Alright then. Artillery strikes are now loading."

Colonel Petrus Storbach was overseeing the first round of many hundreds of volleys that would be shot that night.

"Artillery, are you loaded?!"

The captain of the _Thor_ mortar gave him a thumbs-up and a grin. "We're ready."

Then came the screamed, frenzied orders.

" ** _THEN FIRE!_** "

* * *

 **End Note:**

 **And so it begins!**

 **Some notes:**

 **\- Yes, that is Riza. In this timeline, she is Russian, but with German descent.**

 **\- The _Thor_ cannon, more commonly known as a _Karl-Gerät,_ or literally, 'Karl-device', has a _600 mm_ shell. They were made by the Nazis to use against the Soviets during Operation Barbarossa.**

 **Please leave comments, on what you thought of this chapter! Constructive criticism is accepted! :)**

 **Anyways, hope you enjoyed! Remember to R &R, follow and favorite, and DFTBA!**


	5. Scherzo: Molto vivace

**Author's Note:**

 **School gets out on Friday! FTW!**

 **I will try and get one chapter of this fic finished every week, although I will miss some weeks due to RL.**

 **Anyways, this chapter will feature someone who you will recognize. And it's more of a interlude, than anything.**

 **And lone reviewer...**

 **STAHP READING MY NOTES! :D**

 **Hope you enjoy this chapter!**

* * *

 **Chapter 5 - Scherzo: Molto vivace**

 **Vienna, Germany  
** **January 1st, 1939**

Nowhere was music as prevalent in Europe, as the region of Austria. However, on top of the Heldenplatz flown not the red and white stripes of the Republic of Austria; instead, a symbol, distinguishable by black lines, which made out a swastika, flew over the former country of Austria like a valkyrie slowly rising over the entirety of Europe.

In one of the districts overlooking the Danube River, lived a man of 34 years. To the normal eye, he would have just been a simple musician, playing the violin and guitar for money. However, to look at his face, there were two unique features he donned.

The first, was his striking golden eyes and hair.

In the country, people with blond hair and blue eyes were considered to be superior to other people; specifically, the Jews and the Slavs in Europe. However, many people had never seen such a unique shade of yellow, which made him stand out among his peers and fellow citizens.

The second, was _much_ harder to determine.

One looking at the man may sense that something about him was off; they would usually assume, that he was just inherently _different_ , or special.

But only his closest colleagues knew the truth.

Behind the brown coat and pants, was the mind, body, and soul of Edward Elric, the Fullmetal Alchemist.

* * *

On an unusually warm New Year's Day, Edward Elric was sitting in his study, near the rooms where his wife and children were sleeping, trying to transpose a piece. The fires of his mantel kept crackling, the heads of enraged hydras being tormented in Hell occasionally popping up.

 _It's almost midnight_ , Edward remarked to himself. He placed his hands on his desk, slowly ascending from the chair he was sitting in, turning off his makeshift electrical lamp, and walking towards his small kitchen to fix up some dinner. Edward closed the door to his study, and locked the door.

He peered into the pantry, and sighed. Although the prices had returned to a mostly normal state, at least in pre-war terms, the Nazi government placed many restrictions on the common folk, even expelling the native Jews from cities like Hamburg, and small towns in the countryside.

Edward, however, was a person of interest to the Nazis. The Nazi leadership had finally got around to reviewing what had happened with Eckhart, and Edward had been placed into a precarious situation. His brother's safety was threatened, along with his wife's, and although Edward tried to negotiate a deal with the Führer himself, he was forced from his position as a teacher in Munich, and exiled to Austria.

The exile was pointless, anyways. Germany had absorbed Austria after the Anschluss of 1938, which meant that Edward was once again put at the mercy of the Nazis. They had found him in Vienna, and kept him under watch, prohibiting him from working on his experiments and such.

Afterwards, Edward had found a respectable post as the manager of a small music store which overlooked the Danube River. Edward had not thought much about music beforehand, but his job with the music store changed all of that.

Edward was bombarded with piano works by Mozart and Chopin, the great symphonies of Beethoven and Brahms, and the operas and plays by Wagner; scherzos, concertos, canons, even fugues; Edward was exposed to almost 500 years of music.

Back in Amestris, he only knew the lullaby his mother had taught him, and the Amestrian military's march. After listening to the triumphant Ode to Joy by Beethoven, and the heart-wrenching Lacrimosa from Mozart's Requiem, Edward thought he was never going to go back to his own world for music.

That was, however, assuming he could still get back to Amestris.

* * *

In secret, before the Anschluss, Edward had attempted to summon the portal that would recreate the link between the alchemic world and the non-alchemic world. His memory was sketchy, but still sharp enough to remember most of the little details and pinpricks of the transmutation circle.

What he had observed, was not at all what he was expecting.

Instead of seeing Amestris as he traveled through the Gate, he saw soldiers with swastikas on their uniforms, marching off to war, and ovens alight; to Edward's utmost horror, the ovens were actually filled with the 'undesirables' of the Nazi regime.

But the thing that made Edward want to hurl most, was a simple plane.

On the sides of the plane was a simple white star, in the middle of a blue circle, emboldened by a large R on its tail.

Suddenly, Edward watched, as a bomb, which looked more like an oversized torpedo, fell from a door on the bottom of the plane. The bomb kept falling through the clouds, as Edward watched in chilling suspense at the sky.

A massive ball of smoke suddenly rose through the clouds, sheer force pulsing through the sky. Edward watched, as the scene went dark. What was next, however, changed everything about his morals in terms of warfare and killing.

He could only watch, as entire people's bodies were pulverized by the sheer heat, bright flares and flames coursing through what few remains they had left. Their faces were charred beyond imaginable belief; no, melted would be more accurate.

Edward screamed, as he flailed around, trying to escape the nightmare that would be the future.

" _Make it stop!_ "

He kept on screaming, until everything faded to white.

* * *

All of a sudden, he found himself in a white space. It reminded Edward of writing an epic, then erasing everything, and then rewriting it, all by memory.

He looked around, and behind him was a gate.

Edward gasped, and realized what this gate meant.

" _Hello, Edward Elric._ "

Edward turned around, and saw a white, featureless figure sitting down, with its arm resting on what appeared to be its leg. He gritted his teeth.

"What is this?! I was expecting the-"

The figure laughed. " _Ah, yes! I almost forgot!_ " The figure started laughing.

Edward frowned. "What's wrong with you?"

The figure turned to look at Edward, as an unnatural, maniacal grin came upon its face. " _Quiet, little alchemist._ "

Edward started to yell. "Why you, I'm not-"

Suddenly, Edward felt a tug at his shoulders.

Turning around, he gasped in horror, at a multitude of black hands pulling him towards the inside of the gate. "W-what is this?!"

The figure chortled. " _You are Edward Elric, but you are not at the same time, am I not correct?_ "

Edward gritted his teeth. "What the hell is that supposed to mean?!"

" _You see, I made a deal with someone like you once._ "

"And what's his name?"

The figure started to chuckle, which then turned into insane laughter.

" _That person, young alchemist, was Edward Elric, the Fullmetal Alchemist!_ "

* * *

 **End Note:**

 **Yes, 2003!Edward is in this universe!**

 **Truth is the one talking in the final part of the chapter/interlude.**

 **If you want to know what Edward was seeing, it was Little Boy being dropped on Hiroshima on August 6th, 1945. AKA, in the future.**

 **Since there will be a split narrative (until Brotherhood!Roy and 2003!Edward meet), here's how chapters will be named:**

 **Interludes - French**

 **Roy's chapters - German**

 **Edward's chapters - based on a certain piece of classical music; differs every chapter**

 **For this chapter, it is named after the 3rd movement of the _New World Symphony/Symphony No. 9_ by Antonin Dvořák.**

 **Anyways, hope you enjoyed! I promise, I will get back to Roy! But I really love writing Edward's chapters... XD**

 **Remember to R &R, follow and favorite, and DFTBA!**


	6. Adagio

**Author's Note:**

 **Another Edward chapter! Yay! XD**

 **I really want to write a Roy chapter, but I need to complete more research…**

 **Anyways, hope you enjoy!**

* * *

 **Chapter 6 – Adagio**

" _And that person was Edward Elric, the Fullmetal Alchemist!_ "

Edward was confused. "Wait, what do you mean? How do you-"

The figure silenced him, a black hand covering his mouth. "Oh, it's definitely not _you._ " The figure let out a guffaw, as Edward kept squirming in the black hands.

"See, you might know me as 'the Gate'. However, across all of the worlds, I am known by many names."

The black hands kept creeping towards Edward's head, pulling him closer and closer to the gate, Edward's cries for explanation coming to no avail. However, all was to be revealed in the next minutes.

"I am the World. I am the Universe; or rather, the 'Multiverse'. I am also called God, but Edward Elric knew me as 'the Truth'. I am one, and I am all." The figure pointed at Edward, with a hand that looked more like a black outline on blank paper.

"And I am also you."

The figure spoke. "You have committed a great sin, Edward Elric! You tried to reconnect the portal between worlds, and although you think it was something minor, _would you care to look again?_ "

Edward's eyes widened, as the Gate's doors started to creak open.

"For all actions performed, there is always an equal reaction."

Edward tried to scream, but the black hands prevented him from letting out strings of curses at 'God', and how a god could be so cruel.

* * *

He traveled through the Gate once more, streams of imagery passing by him. However, there was one glaring difference.

It seemed as if there was something at the end, a portal, one could call it, but it was also a gateway to another world.

Edward had thought that the first time traveling through the Gate's stream was painful and horrifying. This time, the visions would blow the old ones out of the water like a powerful rocket.

He saw the dreaded bomb again; this time, however, there was not _only_ one plane that soared through the sky.

There seemed to be what amounted to an air armada of fighter planes, bombers, and planes that literally left tails of fire in their wake. They were numerous, crowding out the sun like darkness descending above the world.

However, just as soon as Edward had started to count the massive amount of planes in the air, he was given simultaneous vision at the same time, of the ground.

What Edward saw would be equivalent to gathering the worst of humanity, concentrating it, and then unleashing the sheer evil and wrongness of it all on the world.

The vision appeared to be what looked like Berlin; however, what he saw there was only the beginning of a show of horrors.

There were dead, rotting corpses of animals laying right next to half-dead children, who were vomiting blood, and bleeding profusely.

The only people walking in the streets were SS officers, who donned masks and protective gear, and little children.

Suddenly, to Edward's shock, as a child was running towards his home, he heard a loud shell from a distance. Edward closed his eyes, but his mouth was quivering.

An explosion rang out, and where the child had once been, became a pile of blood, bones, and flesh, that was burning.

"W-what….what madness is this?!"

Looking even further, he saw a field.

In that field, there were no flowers, not even little twigs of yellow.

There was only dry dirt, and the remains of what had been a German citizen's farm.

* * *

As Edward returned to where Truth was standing, his entire body was shaking, a maniacal giggle coming out his mouth occassionally.

"Tell me….. _what was that?!_ "

Edward started to cry, as Truth started to speak.

"You do know of the Nazis, do you not?"

Edward nodded, through the tears and cold sweat that he was going through.

Truth sighed. "Before you arrived in your 'alternate world', there was a certain….how should I put it….ah, _interference_ in that world."

Edward looked up from his misery and despair. "And how does an 'interference' cause what I just saw?!"

"It was your father."

"My father...wait, do you mean-"

"This will not happen until 1941 in your 'alternate world'. But anyways, there will be a very big war. The war will be so big, that it will be called a 'world' war. But what is a world war, when you have domain over whole universes?"

Edward's heart sank. He had arrived in Germany, 2 years after what many had named 'the Great War', in 1920. He had heard the stories of horror, of bloodshed, and of misery.

Hearing from what amounted to a _god_ saying that there would be a second one made Edward's mind collapse.

"Anyways, in 1941, the Nazis will invade the Soviet Union."

If Edward was drinking at that moment, he would had spit it out. " _What?_ "

"Because of this invasion alone, many _millions_ will die because of the Nazis."

"But how does my father have anything to do with this?"

Truth replied. "In my plans for how that universe should proceed, a letter should have been intercepted, which was a request for winter uniforms and supplies."

"However, in the universe you just saw, Van Hohenheim managed to get that letter to Berlin, albeit, on accident."

"You see, he traveled through many world, trying to find himself. But in your alternate universe, both the one you know, and the one he was seeking, are already dead."

Edward clenched his fist. "But how the hell does a _letter_ indirectly kill millions?!"

"Because, if that letter was sent, the Nazis would have won."

Edward stared, shocked, as Truth kept talking. "They defeated the Soviet Union, and managed to grapple control of almost _100 million_ people, most of which were 'untermensch' to what they call their superior race."

"But, they don't win at the end, do they?"

Truth laughed, as Edward listened, intent on hearing a full explanation. "In the end, the country of Germany had managed to kill 120 million of both their own population and many millions of civilians all over Europe. That number alone does not take into account, the length or widespread wake of the war."

"When the dust settled on March 12th, 1960, over 190 million humans had died as a result of the Second World War."

* * *

Every once in a while, Edward would have nightmares about meeting Truth, and the visions that accompanied it.

All he had saw was truly horrifying, but what scared him most, was that one simple statistic Truth had told him.

 _190 million humans dead…..that's Amestris' population 3 times over!_

Every time the nightmare reappeared, Edward tried his damned hardest to not scream, in fear of waking his wife and children up.

The sights of it all….chemical-laden fields, irradiated towns, they all shot a painful bullet through Edward's experiences.

But most of all, out of all that he saw, was the damned _bomb._

The first vision showed how much one bomb could do to a city; Edward couldn't even comprehend how much damage 7 or more could do to even such a big country as Germany.

Edward sighed, as he pulled the covers towards his head, remembering the visions, as he slowly faded out of consciousness, and into a deep, but relaxing sleep.

* * *

" _The air smelled of smoke and ashes, after the retreat. There was a great panic, as the morale-deprived remains of the 6th Army who had managed to escape were screaming about one of their number blowing himself up._

 _I can barely remember a soldier….what was name? Ah yes, his name was Major Hugo. I think he was killed by a random artillery strike, but then right after came the explosion._

 _The explosion….._

 _I don't recall what happened during that time, but there was one thing for sure: one of those damn fools on the front lines was truly crazy, during the Battle for Stalingrad."_

-Lt. Heinrich Schultz, about the General Retreat, July 6th, 1971

* * *

 **End Note:**

 **And what a _happy_ chapter that was! (Yes, sarcasm.)**

 **The 'visions' that Edward saw in this chapter are from an excellent alternate history masterpiece, _The Anglo-American/Nazi War_ , by CalBear.**

 **The AA/NW is about an alternate timeline, where the deployment of 250,000 troops that were used in North Africa in our timeline, was in Operation Barbarossa.**

 **But all military stuff aside, it ends _badly_ for Europe. :(**

 **Anyways, some notes!:**

 **\- Time traveling Hohenheim! I assume he created the timeline before 2003 FMA, to keep with canon.**

 **\- In Brotherhood, Roy states that Amestris' population is at least 50 million people. There are probably more, so I'll stick with the 'about' statement.**

 **Hope you've enjoyed this fic so far! Leave comments on what _you_ want to see next!**

 **Remember to R &R, follow and favorite, and DFTBA!**


	7. Eisen, Feuer und Wahnsinn - Part 1

**Author's Note:**

 **So, here comes another Roy chapter!**

 **One thing I didn't note last chapter was the inspiration for the chapter. It derives from the Adagio for Strings and Organ by Remo Giazotto.**

 **From here on out, with a few exceptions, all chapters will be ~1500 words per chapter. This, I feel, is a good mark between too short and too long, at least for this fic.**

 **Anyways, hope you enjoy!**

* * *

 **Chapter 7 -** **Eisen, Feuer und Wahnsinn -** **Teil Eins** **(Iron, Fire, and Madness - Part 1)**

 **1st Panzer Group, Outside of Brody, Soviet-Occupied Poland  
** **June 23rd, 1941**

A mere 18 hours after the invasion began, the invasion had advanced quite far. In fact, despite the sheer force that the _Wehrmacht_ possessed versus the Soviets, and the daunting logistical nightmares they faced, they had managed to travel slightly more than 200 kilometers; an impressive feat, to say the least.

However, that state of non-resistance was about to end.

Out near the portable quarters of Lieutenant General Paul Ludwig Ewald von Kleist, a certain Roy Mustang, or to be more exact, his counterpart in this world, was running towards the camp, holding important intelligence information about nearby Soviet forces.

Actually, running wouldn't be exact. Roy was trying to escape a patrol team of Soviet soldiers, who had heard him sneaking around in Brody trying to get intelligence on the Soviet mechanized corps housed in and around the triangle formed around the towns of Dubno, Lutsk, and Brody.

Now, though, Roy was in quite a situation.

He was running through the forest, as shots rang out in the distance behind him. Bullets whizzed by, like the wind blowing bits of snow and ice into someone's face, while the moon flashed in the sky. There seemed to be nothing but himself, Mother Earth, and that patrol of Soviet soldiers.

A part of him inside, the part that Roy had mostly replaced when Truth had transported him to this strange, new world, was clawing into Roy's conscious to kill the Soviet soldiers, and then call out the 700 tanks in the nearby vicinity to assault the forces.

Roy's conscious, the more rational, and also the more sane in control, thought differently compared to the special lieutenant's body he was possessing.

From the meager shreds of 'intelligence' he had gathered, Soviet forces in the area around the triangle numbered outnumbered the 700 tanks the 1st Panzer Group commanded in the same area, by more than 2,000 tanks, enough to completely overwhelm the III Army Corps and XLVIII Panzer Corps.

That reminded Roy of the many differences in this world; the naming of many things.

For most of Roy's life, he was used to calling panzers as 'tanks'. However, as Roy later found out, 'panzer' was just the translation of tank into German.

Another thing that Roy noticed, was the lack of almost any distinction, between Standard Amestrian, and the German language. Sure, there was the occasional accent that one had, like the Briggs soldiers with a slight Drachman accent in his world, and the Polish influence on Pomerania's special vocabulary.

Suddenly, as Roy was starting to think about money, he tripped on a large branch, and fell on his leg, which hit his leg, and stabbed it.

He heard a loud crack, feeling a jolt of pain in his leg. _Shit, my leg!_

Roy heard the Soviet soldiers call out, and start yelling. _If they know I'm here, then I'm screwed!_ He tried to get up, but looking through the dim light of night, he saw small streams of blood running down his leg.

He clenched his teeth and tried to keep moving, but every time he tried to move, he felt that jolt again, and another spurt of blood dripping onto the ground.

 _Shit...what do I have left?_

He opened a small pocket on his uniform, and out came a small cloth, which was meant to be for sleeping.

 _But circumstances be damned!_

Roy painfully unraveled the cloth, made out of cotton, eventually making a straight line of fabric partially stained by the blood already on the ground. It left a reddish hue on the cloth, but it would later be made fully red by blood anyways, though Roy.

Slowly, but surely, Roy started to wrap the cotton fabric around the gashed wound, eventually wrapping the entire wound in 7 layers of fabric. He could still see blood seeping through the fabric, but by this point, he had already lost enough to warrant collapsing.

In the final moments before falling unconscious, Roy shot his emergency signal flare through the forest, for the very first time in his life.

It would not be his last.

* * *

Nearby, a local civilian, who had 'defected' to the _Wehrmacht_ , spotted a signal flare.

Going down to the camp, from the top of the church steeple, he yelled out in the loudest voice he could:

" _There's been a signal flare that's been fired!_ "

In moments, the camp below had decided their next course of action.

Lieutenant General Kleist yelled out the orders:

" _We're moving out!_ "

* * *

Near the camp, many pilots began to start up their planes, loading them with bombs, and replenishing their stocks of fuel, ammunition, and emergency supplies, before then waiting for their lead commander, the Wing Captain, to issue orders.

Their planes flared up, propellers rotating through the air, as the bodies of their planes flew up into the sky, eventually coalescing into a massive air armada in the sky.

As the air armada flew through the sky, an unfortunate Soviet air squadron, made primarily of Tupolev SBs, were trying to land on the ground. Unfortunately for the squadron, as soon as the armada came within firing distance of the planes, the planes were shot with with salvos and volleys of bullets, eventually taking down the entire squadron in an inferno of fire, gasoline, and explosions.

On the ground, meanwhile, tank crews revved up hundreds of tanks, and preparing for orders from Lt. General Kleist, on what to do next. 30 minutes after the lieutenant general had gave the initial orders, they received their answer:

 _Hold your ground._

* * *

 **End Note:**

 **I SAID EXCEPTION. THIS IS ONE. :P :D**

 **Anyways, some explanations:**

 **\- I'm running a lot of things from Wikipedia, so if I'm historically wrong, then please feel free to correct me.**

 **\- Roy suffered from a stab. Not a broken leg. A STAB.**

 **\- Basically, Roy is going to be incredibly lucky. Until _that_ one battle you may have heard of. Hint: think south, and think really freaking _big._**

 **I'm going to be gone in two weeks, until about July 12th. So, I'm going to try and get a lot done until then, like work on this.**

 **This is a pleasure to write, and I hope you enjoy it about as much as I do. :)**

 **Remember to R &R, follow and favorite, and DFTBA!**


	8. Eisen, Feuer und Wahnsinn - Part 2

**Author's Note:**

 **Writer's block...can't...write...**

 **This chapter sucked to write. That is all.**

 **Also,** ** _as I've mentioned earlier_** **, I'll be gone over the weekend, and the next 2 weeks after next Monday. So, enjoy while you can!**

 **Remember to R &R, follow and favorite, and DFTBA!**

* * *

 **Chapter 8 -** **Eisen, Feuer und Wahnsinn - Teil Zwei** **(Iron, Fire, and Madness - Part 2)**

As Roy woke up to see a bright light flashing in his face, he was greeted with the splitting image of Basque Grand.

During his 'tenure' in this alternate world, he had come up with a hypothesis: for every person who existed in his world, then they would have a 'counterpart' in the world Roy was in.

He had already noticed this with alternate Havoc and Hughes; physically, they stayed mostly the same. However, as he saw with Hughes, there were differences. Many of the counterparts he had met, to his horror, were either incredibly racist, or 'just' following orders. All of the racism he had saw, however, was venomous compared to the military academy.

He had learned, that under the leadership of Führer Adolf Hitler, Germany would purge itself of 'subhumans', and establish a thousand-year empire. Roy had seen much, but this was too much to swallow.

Already, thoughts of mutiny swam through his head, but Roy was also a realist.

He knew, that if he were to attempt an uprising, then he would be shot by a firing squad, and people with connections to him would also be in danger. He was lucky, ironically, that his closest men in his world, weren't close at all in this world. That meant, because he had not yet met Riza's counterpart, that he had absolutely _no_ emotional connections related to him.

This was good, in a sense, because if he were to be captured, no blackmail would get him to speak out. It was a double-edged sword, however, in that it meant he was isolated for the first time since before meeting Riza.

As he was thinking, Basque Grand's counterpart shook him. "Wake up, soldier!"

This snapped Roy out of his thoughts. "H-huh?!"

He stared at Grand, who sighed.

"You're injured."

Roy listened, as his eyes gazed up and down his body. Suddenly, as he tried to walk, he felt waves of pain radiating from his knee.

"Dammit!" Roy shouted, as he started to fall onto the wooden floor. He tried to get up, but as he bent his knee, it hurt even more.

Grand motioned, holding his hand out for Roy to grab. Roy slowly ascended, trying to avoid applying pressure to his knee. Grand held back...

 _A grin?!_

Grand started to speak. "You damn soldiers, you always want to get back up and fighting, don't you?"

Roy, through the pain, let out a smirk. "That describes a lot of us perfectly."

Now that his mind was now back to 'reality', Roy noted the differences with the two Basque Grands.

First, there was no mustache.

And second, a lot of the muscle that would be associated with the Armstrongs were gone. However, he still looked like he was reasonably fit, and in good order, too.

"What's your name, Doctor?"

Grand let out a laugh. "You don't know my name? Ah, my friend, you should."

Once again, he reached his hand towards Roy.

"Glad to meet you. My name is Paul Rostock."

* * *

Roy hissed, as Doctor Rostock applied bandages and medicine to his knee. Through it, though, he still managed to not interrupt the process, which, although painful, did provide a slight degree of relief to his wounded knee.

It was now the 26th, and Roy had been 'out of commission' per say, since the 23rd. Since then, the _Wehrmacht_ had been assaulted by Soviet tanks, which numbered 167, compared to the Germans' 728 combined tanks commandeered by Field Marshal Kleist.

Roy looked up at Doctor Rostock, and tried to communicate through the pain.

"Doctor...what is the situation of battle?"

Doctor Rostock sighed, and shook his head. "Lieutenant Rotenstein, I honestly don't know. And I don't want to know."

"Why is that?" Roy asked.

The doctor looked at Roy. "I haven't fought since the Great War." Then he looked back at Roy.

"Do you want to know why I hate war?"

Roy was morbidly curious. "I'm interested. You don't seem like the kind of man who would fight in a war."

Rostock looked down, and started to recall the memories.

"When the war broke out, I eagerly joined the war, just like how so many of you are jumping into this whirlwind of death."

"Initially, things were looking up. I was assigned to the Western Front, and it seemed as if we would take Paris as fast as the Prussians did in the War of Unification. Everything seemed to be going right, and nothing could go wrong."

Roy noticed the doctor's face darken. "But then, I fought at the Marne."

"Suddenly, me and my entire generation witnessed what war was truly like; it was not a romantic pursuit, like a vacation; rather, it was a something that dropped war down to outright barbarianism."

He watched Doctor Rostock bitterly smile, while describing. "Once upon a time, I had 3 older brothers, a mother, and a father. We all lived happily in a small farm near Munich, and it was tranquil, with no problems, aside from childish pranks and mundane things in life."

The smile disappeared. "But then...war and famine took them all. Johann...he was killed by an accidental artillery misfire during the Battle of the Somme. My mother...she died of pneumonia, after the terrible winter of 1918 weakened her body so much."

"My father, Ludwig, and Friedrich...they all perished at the Marne, in a futile charge into No Man's Land. I watched in horror, as the one who gave me blood, and the ones who took care of me for much of my childhood give their own lives for Germany; for what? At the end...what did their sacrifice do for Germany?"

He spat bitterly. " _Nothing,_ that's what. The goddamn war took everything away from me; my family, my country, basically everything. I had nothing left at the end, only the clothes on my back, and leftover rations."

Finally, it seemed he was done with his recollection.

"After proper education and sheer luck, I decided to become a doctor. After witnessing war for my very own eyes, I didn't want to take life. Rather, I decided I wanted to be able to save it, and prevent something like the Great War from ever happening again."

Doctor Rotstock frowned. "However, it seems that is not the case. Now, I am what you youths may call 'old', and possibly to the point that I could just retire." Then, he asked Roy something: "So, what do you think?"

He got his answer in the form of a lieutenant, sweating profusely, and breathing heavily. Roy was in a state of shock, and started to convulse a bit.

"Ishvalans...the fires...the air...oh god, oh god...no, Hughes... _HUGHES!_ "

* * *

 **End Note:**

 **Some notes:**

 **\- For Basque Grand's counterpart, only the name is the same. However, he is based off of RL Paul Rostock, who was a professor at the University of Berlin, and was one of the people who were accused in the Doctors' Trial, after World War II**

 **Anyways, my trip begins tomorrow! This is the final update until next month, so I hope you guys wait~!**

 **Remember to R &R, follow and favorite, and DFTBA!**


	9. Marche au Supplice

**Author's Note:**

 **I hope you enjoy this chapter! ^_^**

* * *

 **Chapter 9 - Marche au Supplice (March to the Scaffold)**

This was no ordinary dream; rather, it was exposing his mind to the worst of his fears. It was like a dark fantasy; one that he did not wish to see, but was forced to see.

He saw millions of things in his tempest of dreams; one flash was that of 23 knifes stabbing into the flesh of the leader of a great, and powerful country; another was being nailed to a cross with nails connecting the man's flesh to the wooden sticks.

Those were not the only visions he saw; he saw flashes of fire consuming an entire city, thousands of people evaporating due to the sheer heat of it all.

If there was one recurring theme he could find in all of the visions, it was death.

Death, misery, pain. That one word prompted more visions.

As bombs rained from the sky, falling upon rows upon rows of buildings and housing, there was a lone cellist playing a melancholy passage amidst the destruction. All around him, was the ruins of a fountain, and dust covered his clothing.

Another vision, however, horrified him the most.

It was of a world he was all too familar with; the world of alchemy.

* * *

Roy awakened, his eyes slowly opening. However, as he opened his eyes, they widened, staring at the scene around him.

He was bound to a wall with cuffs; his gloves were missing, and there was dried blood on his hands.

Looking at his hands, he was horrified at what he saw.

On his hands, was fresh blood spelt, and the tatoo of the Ouroboros.

As Roy screamed, he failed to notice 2 guards coming in. They looked familiar, and sure enough, the two were Jean Havoc and Riza Hawkeye.

"Lieutenant Haw-"

He felt a bullet tear through his knee. Screaming, he tried to yell, but as soon as his mouth opened, Havoc punched him in the jaw.

"I'm ashamed to even be with you right now. This kind of vile monster should be sent to the pits of hell, not to a hanging quarter."

Inside, Roy broke.

This had to be some kind of joke, right?

Unfortunately for him, the next words that Havoc said shattered any hope of jest.

With a look of triumph, Havoc shoved Roy into a car, as Hawkeye started up the car. "This is the day the final homunculus dies."

* * *

When they had reached what appeared to be Central Command, Roy, to the best of ability, tried to find out what was going on.

 _No...no..this can't be right!_

When Havoc stopped, he pulled Roy out of the car, and escorted him to what appeared to be a wooden board.

The board was elevated by planks, but the thing that caught Roy's eye was the blade right past the center of the board, just to the left.

"Here he is, fellow citizens of Amestris! The final homunculus!"

Roy was ashamed to be there, but there was more.

He saw, that a large crowd had started to congregate around the platform where he was on, as they started to boo and hiss.

 _Wait….what's going on?! Why am I here?!_

Roy's mind kept screaming, but his mouth remained shut, in fear of being talked down.

"Kill the traitor!"

"Liberty and justice for all! Down with the false leader!"

As the final pieces of the mob gathered, Havoc sneered, as Roy was pushed to what he finally identified as a guillotine.

"So, any last words?"

Roy sweated, with a hard face. "...I-"

" _Liberty and justice, for all!_ "

Moments before the blade came searing through his neck, Roy heard one final voice before blank white engulfed eternity.

 _ **You are not alone.**_

* * *

When Roy woke up, he was in a sweat, face afire and atmosphere tense.

He started to ventilate, until Doctor Rostock came in, and started trying to get him to calm down.

"Lieutenant, calm down!"

This only made Roy hyperventilate even more. Paul, seeing the situation, finally replied.

"What happened, Lieutenant?"

Roy, although he was breathing like a pump on overdrive, gave his response in little snippets.

"Dream...execution...Gate...death..."

The doctor sighed. He knew his 'miracle tonic' had side effects, but the ones that Roy was exhibiting were incredibly abnormal.

Paul started to massage Roy. "Lieutenant, breathe in."

Roy breathed, as waves of fresh air came pouring into his lungs.

"Now, breathe out."

The air came out as a surge, a tidal wave of stress relieved from Roy's current mentality.

Paul looked at Roy, as he walked to the side of him, knees kneeled down.

"So, tell me Lieutenant. What did you see in your dream?"

* * *

"This is surprising, to say the least."

Roy laid on his back, over the sheets of the medical bed.

"Lieutenant, have you ever heard of the _Symphonie fantastique_?"

"No Doctor; I have not."

He watched, as Paul pulled out a book. Upon further inspection, it appeared to be a encyclopedia, of Western European cultures.

The doctor opened the book, flipping page upon page of material. Finally, after a few minutes of flipping, the doctor stopped.

"Here is a summary of the 4th movement of the piece."

Roy nodded, as the doctor started to read.

" _Convinced that his love is unappreciated, the artist poisons himself with opium. The dose of narcotic, while too weak to cause his death, plunges him into a heavy sleep accompanied by the strangest of visions. He dreams that he has killed his beloved, that he is condemned, led to the scaffold and is witnessing his own execution. As he cries for forgiveness the effects of the narcotic set in. He wants to hide but he cannot so he watches as an onlooker as he dies. The procession advances to the sound of a march that is sometimes sombre and wild, and sometimes brilliant and solemn, in which a dull sound of heavy footsteps follows without transition the loudest outbursts. At the end of the march, the first four bars of the idée fixe reappear like a final thought of love interrupted by the fatal blow when his head bounced down the steps._ "

He shut the book, and looked at Roy. "So, how much of that sounds familiar?"

Roy was astonished. Up until now, he had virtually never heard any pieces of music in the 'alternate' world. However, after hearing about this, he was sure that there was no coincidence.

"Did you see anyone you...loved?"

That was the million-dollar question that the almost unquestioned master of alchemy in the alternate world could not answer.

* * *

 **End Note:**

 **Cliffhanger! ;D**

 **Some notes:**

 **\- The chapter title is based off of the 4th movement of the _Symphonie fantastique_ by Hector Berlioz, Marche au Supplice (or, March to the Scaffold in English). A scaffold is a platform where people stand on before they get beheaded or hung.**

 **\- If you didn't get the references in the first part of the chapter, then here they are (in order): Julius Caesar, Jesus Christ, Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Bosnian War**

 **Anyways, hope you enjoyed this chapter! Remember to R &R, follow and favorite, and DFTBA!**


	10. Sturm der Träume

**Author's Note:**

 **Woo-hoo! Chapter 10, here we go!**

* * *

 **Chapter 10 -** **Sturm der Träume (Tempest of Dreams)**

When the battle finally ended on the 30th of June, it was clear who the winner was.

Thousands of Soviet personnel laid dead, dying from the attacks of the Luftwaffe, along with the Panzers. Among Soviet losses, was eight hundred destroyed tanks. Despite the sheer advantage in numbers, even quantity could not compare against quality.

Meanwhile, the _Wehrmacht_ also took losses; although, not to the extent that the Red Army had.

About 200 panzers were destroyed by the end, with a token amount of losses. Most of them came when Roy was incapacitated, but some had also been between the time Roy had been unconscious in the woods and the time he was found by a squad of brigadiers.

As the panzers rolled across the fields, Roy was in a truck.

* * *

"Urgh..."

Roy, blurry-eyed, blinked his eyes, and rolled to his side.

He struggled to lift the pistol, trying to test how well he was. It was a Luger; on the side was an engraving drawn with a knife. The engraving was of two thunder bolts, which looked like an _SS_ to him. He knew what it stood for; it was the initials for the _Schutzstaffel_.

From common knowledge and rumors, Roy learned that being discovered as a member of the SS was tantamount to being marked for death. It had only been the matter of a week, and thousands of civilians had already been slaughtered by _Wehrmacht_ soldiers and _Einsatzgruppen_ death squads, part of the SS.

He gripped the pistol, and sighed. The engraving, or the remains of what had been carved bit into Roy's hand. It was irritating, to say the least, but it didn't cause bleeding, either.

Something felt very out of place, but Roy couldn't name it.

"Doctor, what is my situation?"

An female assistant to the doctor nodded. Doctor Rostock started to talk, with a grim expression on his face.

"Well, 2nd Lieutenant, I have both good and bad news."

Roy looked at him, sweating and in a low intensity pain, but managed to speak. "Give me the good news first, Doctor."

"The good news, is that due to your heroic actions in the Battle of Brody, as it has been named, the higher-ups have decided to promote you to the rank of Captain."

He sighed, slowly starting to move towards the bed.

"The bad news..."

He slowly pulled the white sheets off of Roy. Roy gasped, putting his hands towards where his right leg once was.

"Your leg was infected, soldier. I'm terribly sorry, but it had to be done to save your life."

He shook, looking at the stump that was left of his leg. There was a wide array of bandages, with much of them covered in blood. He tried to shake his leg, but all he felt was the numb movement of his thigh shaking around.

Roy started to scream, as the terrible sound of agony and pain ripped through the entire supply line of the army.

All of a sudden, he felt a pain in his chest. Slowly, he fell into a deep, deep sleep, one fueled by a plethora of sedatives and medical drugs.

The final thing he heard before his senses completely turned off, was Doctor Rostock quietly speaking to himself.

"I'm sorry Heinrich."

* * *

Once again, Roy was in a dream state. Everything seemed to be distorted or abstract; colors flowed like streams of water, hues of vibrant turquoise and deep purple all flashed like a mass of lights flying around.

Although Roy was dreaming, he could sense everything: gurgling inside of him was the feeling of hatred, of fire and of iron.

The colors, feeling them, was like the rough fur of a bear. It was smooth, yet patches and certain parts of the stream felt like they could scrape steel at varied points.

Suddenly, Roy felt a pain in his leg. _Wait, what?! I thought I was dreaming!_

Realization dawned upon him, as it slowly occurred to Roy that his right leg was gone.

"My...my leg..."

Upon realizing the fact at hand, he started to scream, twisting and flailing through the vivid dream landscape. The stump leg started to bleed, causing Roy more agony, and flaring pain.

As much as it pained Roy to think about, he realized, that this was how Edward Elric felt like on that fateful day.

The agonized screams of Roy Mustang filled the entire scene. In the background, the vivid streams started to turn into blood red, with horrors in the background that no one could describe. Abominations vaguely resembling dozens of failed chimera experiments and flesh sacrificed started to appear, moaning and groaning like a devil's awful cacophony.

All of a sudden, a thought came to Roy. _Dammit, I don't want to escape this damn labyrinth doing this. But I'm going to have to, Truth be damned!_

Slowly cutting himself with the combined efforts of his teeth and fingernails, blood started to drip out of his hand, as Roy started drawing a circle.

When the outer circle was done, he started to draw the inner circle. Although there were many differences, compared to the normal circle desperate alchemists would usually use, it kept the core mechanics of what needed to be drawn.

Blood covered the circle, as Roy gritted his teeth. He was rapidly losing blood, and one delay could end his life in the dream landscape, placing him in a coma he could never recover from. So, as he finished the human transmutation circle, he had one thought.

 _Lieutenant_

" _Sigillum ignis_ complete..."

 _Lieutenant..._

" _Magni sigilli_ finished..."

 _Lieutenant..._

Then came the thunderous clap of a thousand hands.

" _Lieutenant!_ "

* * *

 **End Note:**

 **Well, this is going to be the last chapter for a while. :(**

 **School starts in two days, so I won't have as much time to update this as 333 Ways.**

 **But I promise, that there will be at least 3 chapters before winter break rolls around! There may be more, but it's unlikely.**

 **Anyways, some notes:**

 **\- Watching Madoka has an effect on your psyche.**

 **\- Translations: Sigillum ignis = Fire seal,** **Magni sigilli = Great seal**

 **\- I imagined the final part of the chapter playing with Let It Out in the background. Yeah, I'm a terrible person.**

 **Anyways, hope you enjoyed this chapter! As mentioned above, this will be the last one for a while. So, please wait for new updates!**

 **Remember to R &R, follow and favorite, and DFTBA!**


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